Terry Fuller
terry_fuller@bcit.ca
Instructional
Development Consultant
British
Columbia Institute of Technology
Vancouver,
British Columbia
Where I've Been
I was born in San
Francisco, California, and raised
in San Jose. In 1981, I moved
to Canada,
and became a Canadian in 1987. During the 1990s I lived in Mexico
for a couple of years, and two years in Oman
(one of the Gulf States). While
working for BCIT, I have consulted in a number of countries like Chile,
Jamaica, Mexico
and Thailand.
Since I love to travel and experience different cultures, it's been fabulous.
My Life as an Educator
I guess you could say that
I specialize in faculty development. I consult with faculty at BCIT when they
want to improve their teaching, put a course, or part of a course, online.
I have a master's degree in Instructional Technology (instructional design
and development) from San Jose State
University, so I guess that makes
me a bit of an expert in these things. But, to be honest, I am always learning
new things, always a novice.
Which is good for this field,
as the technology is constantly changing. What is exciting now is that better
technology is emerging at the same time that brain research is uncovering
new things about how we learn. One of my favourite
websites below covers this (How People Learn). Once you think you're
an expert, you find out you're out of date. It behooves us to be humble!
My teaching style is "guide on the side". I like
learners to work in groups as much as possible. Some of my best courses have
been teaching workshops in Oman
where I was coaching faculty to integrate technology into their lessons. I
got them to surf the net to find their hometown newspapers, make their own
homepages, upload pictures, etc. It was great because
most of them were away from home and family (for example, many of them were
from Egypt,
Jordan, Syria,
etc.), so I had their attention from the beginning!
My biggest teaching challenge
was in Oman.
I was trying to convince the mullahs that the Internet was a good thing for
education. During my first workshop, I had participants sign up with Hotmail
for their email accounts. I was using a laptop projector, and what do you think was projected on the wall?
An advertisement for "soft porn!" Thanks to Allah,
and lucky for me, they didn't know what it meant!
When I'm Not Working...
Last summer we went sailing
to some pretty exotic places in the British Columbia
Gulf Islands.
Jedadiah
Island
was my favourite. I was also able to scare the
bejezus out of myself when we encountered some
small-craft-warning winds. Got some notches in my belt for that one!
I have a pleasure craft operator's license and have taken the Power
Squadron course (that's me at the helm!). One of the best things I ever did
for myself!
We recently bought a canoe
that will take us to other places we haven't been before in B.C. We have taken
canoeing lessons, and have the first level lakewater certificates. We also do some biking. Last New
Year's Eve we took the ferry to Salt
Spring Island,
then biked 14 kilometres
into Ganges. It wasn't by design, but rather we took
the wrong ferry. The right ferry would have landed us only 3 kilometres from where we wanted to be. However, we still
had enough vim and vigour to stay up to welcome
in 2002.
I am a pretty good photographer, and I love to photograph all
the different places I go. Life is a journey, and I want to remember the beauty
along the way.
This is one of my favourite spots in the Gulf
Islands - Clam
Bay. It's always so peaceful and
serene (at least the times I have been there!).
Web Sites I Like
Here are some of my favourite spots!